’56 Chev Custom (Jelly Bean)

Dennis probably build this starting in 1967 or early 1968. Two donor ’56 Chev were used from the parts car inventory in the junk yard behind Jerry’s Auto Sales. The front is from a ’56 sedan and the back from a ’56 wagon. Dennis hand built the frame and suspension (see pictures) A new block, heads and intake were purchased assembled from Gary Anderson. Gary had the heads done at Mondello Performance Products in CA. (Legend is Gary paid $800 back in the late 60s for the head work) Dennis fabricated and welded the two bodies together and fit it to the frame he built. The focus was on weight so things like the door frames were cut out. Full roll bar was custom fabricated and Dennis did occassionally street this car be adding functional headlights, license plate, full exhaust and front turn signals. There was no passenger seat but there are more than a few stories of Dennis giving rides to people while they held onto the roll bar. Most were scared enough that they wouldn’t take a second ride! Dennis raced this car in the C – altered class at Pacific Raceways, Bremerton Raceways and Puyallup Dragway. The initial revision of the car ran #35 and a later revision ran #85, adding hood scoop, additional text on the back.

I believe the Jelly Bean was sold early in 1971. It was spotted in the Des Moines, WA area as late as 1983 and I have one picture of it with a different paint job that was likely after Dennis sold it.